The Frequent Fryers Get Best Beach Seats

By PETER C. BELLER

Published: August 24, 2003

BEACHFRONT property in Amagansett has long been scarce, but at Indian Wells Beach, even a spot on the beach itself might be taken these days. Frequent-flyer hours at the Amagansett Beach Association's part of the beach can give a nameless patch of sand something akin to property rights.

''We've always gone to the left of the lifeguard stand,'' said Loraine Boyle, a longtime summer resident. ''It's really funny. Everybody sits where they've always sat.''

The Boyles, like the other 94 families who belong to the association, choose a spot on the beach by having the staff plant their assigned blue-and-white striped chairs and umbrellas in the sand, just to the east of the Indian Wells Beach public parking lot.

The beach is about a mile south of the Amagansett commercial strip on Route 27. As the sunbathing population at Indian Wells Beach has grown, so has the association, which primarily provided a place to change into a bathing suit in the 1920's. Now its main draw is its private parking lot.

To save time and keep the members happy, the club staff gets started in the morning before anyone else is on the beach, setting up the chairs and umbrellas of those who come to the beach every day. The frequent beachgoers can expect to find their favorite spots waiting for them when they arrive.

''Usually, the regulars are the front row right across because they're here more than the others,'' said Matt Brierley, 14, who is spending his first summer working for the association. ''We make a list of where they want us to put the chairs.''

Members who don't show up as frequently ask the staff to place their chairs when they arrive, choosing any spot that is not already taken, Matt said. They usually ask to be as close to the water as possible, he said.

Years ago, when their children were young, Ms. Boyle and her husband, the actor Peter Boyle, would arrive early and often, taking a spot near the water alongside other families with young children who needed supervision while playing in the surf.

''I think that's how it started,'' Ms. Boyle said. ''We were close to the water. Now we're pushed way back'' because they come less frequently.

Mary Ellen McGuire, an East Hampton real estate broker and former association president, said she lost her spot up front as her children and her friends' children grew up and she went to the beach less and less.

''I have five kids, so I was there a lot,'' Ms. McGuire said. ''It was a lot of fun, but we did kind of sit in the same places, where our friends were. You'd gravitate there. You'd stop along the way and talk to other people, but you wouldn't sit there because that was their space.''

Several groups of members traditionally sit next to the lifeguard chair, Ms. McGuire said.

''There was a hierarchy that had their special seats,'' Ms. McGuire said. ''There were always people who sat there, with their friends, they had their own little thing that they did.''

''Some of the people up front have always been there,'' Ms. McGuire said. ''It's not a status thing with them. They're retired. They go down early. But there is a group that thinks it shows that they're important that they sit in the front.''

People have occasionally grumbled about the priority given to veteran members, berating the staff for not treating them as regulars, said Kevin Powell, a lifeguard.

''It kind of became a status thing,'' Ms. McGuire explained. ''Some of the people who had been there a while thought they should move to the front.''

Sometimes people choose one side of the lifeguard chair or the other depending on whom they do or do not want to see, Mr. Powell added.

The association's president, Jamie Hastings Ferraro, was quick to dismiss any notion that the members' seating preferences represent a social division.

''I think it's just more force of habit and just where you're more comfortable,'' said Ms. Ferraro, a lawyer from Westchester County.

''We'll sometimes joke, 'Are you going to walk over to the east side or the west side?' There's no ill feelings between people who sit on one side of the lifeguard stand or the other.''

Whatever the disagreements over the years, the association's members are at the beach primarily to enjoy the spectacular beauty of the ocean and each other's company, Ms. Ferraro said. As with any group, people are not always going to see eye to eye,'' she said. ''I don't know of any feuds. We don't draw a line in the sand.''

Photo: Some Amagansett Beach Association members prize front-row chairs. (Photo by Gordon M. Grant for The New York Times)